The Lesson of God's Blessings and Empathy With Others

There is another purpose in trials and sufferings that is very helpful: they teach us to value the blessing of God. Trials teach Christians that obedience at all costs, even in the middle of a difficult trial, leads to the blessings of God. Reason says grab what you can grab in the world and go. Sensation and feeling say find pleasure at any price. But faith says obey the word of God and be blessed. (see Hebrews 5:7-9)

Philippians 2:8-9 affirms this truth about Jesus in another way: "And being found in the appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore also God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name."

Because Jesus was fully man as well as fully God, He was not exempt from pain and hardship while on earth. He was called to be the Suffering Servant (Isa. 53). Jesus learned the full meaning of obedience by that which he suffered, including death on the cross (see again Hebrews 5:8), and because of that obedience was exalted by God. The path to blessing is often through suffering, but always through obedience.

The Lesson of Empathy with Others

One thing all people can appreciate is the ability of others to identify with and understand their particular life situation, problem, unusual experience, or suffering. Whether it's spending time in the hospital and having the doctors and nurses understand the pain you're having, or dealing with the death or disaster and having a sensitive friend know just what you're feeling as you battle through the problem, it is reassuring when others can emphathize with you. And that is another valuable purpose for suffering: to enable us to help others in their suffering.

In the opening verses of his second letter to the Corinthians, Paul says that God "comforts us in all our afflictions so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God" (1:4). Sometimes God's reason for allowing trials and sufferings to come our way is so we may be able to minister better later on to others who are suffering.

Again the writer of Hebrews tells us how Jesus exemplifies one of the purposes for suffering. Through His own testings and sufferings as the perfect man, Jesus as our High Priest is able to sympathize with our weaknesses and sufferings (2:18; 4:15). He revealed His empathy to Peter during the Last Supper: "Simon, Simon, behold, Satan has demanded permission to sift you like wheat; but I have prayed for you, that your faith may not fail; and you, when once you have turned again, strengthen your brothers" (Luke 22:31-32).

(The Power of Suffering, John MacArthur Jr.)